Productivity: Pick a Small Corner

Productivity: Pick a Small Corner

I was marveling over a new friend’s site, Big Bottom, which is not about that, potty brain. It’s about bass players. Musicians. Take something as big as music, and specialize down to bass players. It’s brilliant. The idea is small enough to drive very specific traffic, and yet large enough to include a lot of people who can appreciate the idea.

So how’d Dale do it? He picked a small corner, and went to work.

Applied to Life Hacking

There are LOTS of jobs that just look too daunting when you view the whole thing. Dishes piled high in the sink after a party always look 300 times higher than they are. Writing a novel sounds horrible when you consider all 300 pages that have to be written. You can go another way and say that just blanket saying, “write a novel!” is too big a thing. Jason Fried preaches about the beauty of constraints all the time at 37 Signals, right?

Pick a Small Corner

In GTD terms, this is pretty much Next Action space. But perhaps this is kind of like completing a series of Next Actions without trying to look too hard at the bigger picture. Just accept that it’s out there, and believe that what you’re about to do is going to move that goal along eventually, but squint about it. Don’t think too hard. Just go into doing.

Accept that the project is big. Just do this first thing.

Accept that this first thing is complex. Just take the first step.

Accept that failure might come early. Stop. Take a breath. Go.

Set tiny goals, very tiny goals. (When I started running, I’d say all throughout the run, “I’m going to stop at that tree up there. That’s totally where I’m gonna stop. Okay, you can stop there,” I’d say to myself. When I got really close, I’d say, “Forget it. I’m already here. But I’m only going to run as far as that tree, then.” )

Don’t stop to pat yourself on the back. Notch the milestone, and move forward.

If you lose focus, say out loud, “Small corner.” Say it again.

Finish as much as you can manage, celebrate what you’ve done, and try moving to something else for just a minute.

Come back and do more. You can pull off tons of false stops and move things forward.

On that higher level, picking a small corner means understanding that there’s lots that you could do, and that it becomes a matter of taking a look at the larger chaos, squinting, and then narrowing your goal down to that one thing that you think you can accomplish as a small corner goal. Remember that constraints — especially those that are self-imposed — are good for helping you move foward. (I use constraints in building processes for myself and my new business).

Let me know what you think of this one. Personally, I think learning how to execute the small bits is what gives you confidence to pull off the larger plays. We’d love your feedback.

Chris Brogan writes about self-improvement and creativity at [chrisbrogan.com], when he’s not appreciating Big Bottom (the website, silly!)